


With Flying Colours

by abbichicken



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Autoerotic Asphyxiation, Friendship, Knifeplay, M/M, Self-Mutilation, Unhealthy Relationships, Wrangling
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-01-08
Updated: 2012-01-08
Packaged: 2017-10-29 05:52:00
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,502
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/316496
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/abbichicken/pseuds/abbichicken
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>An account of the glorious mess they're in: Sherlock and John are tied in something bloody and filthy and worth spending two and a half thousand words contemplating, honest.<br/>______</p><p>Archive warnings tag used for warning for unapologetic, kink-led, potentially insensitive approach to potentially sensitive topics: see tags for definition.</p>
            </blockquote>





	With Flying Colours

The truth of it all is that, much as John cares, outwardly, to the others that factor their way into their lives, for Sherlock's wellbeing, and as widely as he expresses to everyone around them his concern that Sherlock might be having 'a danger night', or that he might be swayed this way, that way, even pulled under by the complexity of one event, or the absence of another, he is only there with Sherlock in the first place because he is attracted to his unpredictability, a vast part of which is Sherlock's attachment to practices which place him beyond the recognisable realms of safety and security, of normality and understanding.

It happens that Sherlock is an extreme sport in himself; he could come with goggles and a safety harness and it wouldn't be out of place at all. He is good value at his best, entertaining and amusing when he feels like it, able to behave with good grace and good will even, contrary to the prevailing opinion - they've spent so long together now that John understands that he sees more of Sherlock's good side than perhaps anyone else ever has, and every time Sherlock tries to be good, to be kind, it is so _touching_ \- but he is also prone to the most terrifying and bizarre behaviours, extremes of expression which John did not think possible in men who were not confined to prison, to war or to institutions.

And Sherlock is not ill, not crazed, no, he is not even an addict by its classic definition, for he is truly and utterly _aware_ at every moment of his existence, in control, even when it appears otherwise. In absolute consciousness, without warning, he'll slit his wrists three ways to show John why it won't kill you, won't even bleed the way you'd hope it would, and wait calmly whilst John swabs and binds him back up, or he'll ingest poisons before inducing vomiting, to check the rate at which they might take effect, so that John then comes in and spends half the night cleaning sweat and spit from Sherlock's face, holding him up whilst he retches into a plastic bowl, then he spends the remainder of the night sat the other side of the room not caring at all, honestly, no, but all the while watching and assessing and noting things down where the internet will never find them, keeping check that Sherlock's existence continues, in spite of himself.

John will warn him over and over, "One day I won't get back in time..." to which Sherlock, missing - or skipping - every point of concern, always replies, "What makes you think that it's ever about you?" and John wonders if Sherlock was always this careless, if he was truly this dependent on someone else before he came along, if there was anyone else that was, even for the shortest of times, willing to patch him back together, or if he simply rode out the consequences of his thoughtlessness alone, shaking and choking into nothing in a corner. It wouldn't be surprising if that was what caused him to shed flatmates like he does common courtesy, and yet there's no way of getting that kind of information out of him. "The past is over, and it was dull enough whilst it was happening - what would I have kept that in my mind for? It isn't as if there's an infinity of space, even in my head..."

And up until this point, or at least until just before it, John has lived the majority of his life on the cautious side, has struggled with the in-between times, the times when he is not forced to examine himself over and over again in the reflection of the unpredictability of others, when he isn't taking decision after decision with life and death in his hands, and when that existence was ramped up to include the threat to his own life, everything that came afterwards was deflated, dull, droll. Having encountered humans willing to do very literally anything, to then be placed back in a world of humans who do virtually nothing is as, if not more, terrifying.

To imagine that your life is over at his age, that you will never see such excitement again, to have experienced moments where you felt that your life was truly over, in the most heroic of ways, to discover that it is not, and that you must do something more...the only time he's ever believed in fate was the first evening where Sherlock threw himself into a case so viciously that he disappeared into some kind of impenetrable state of existence, sitting, poised, posed, for hours on end, only to burst into life without warning, shouting and sparkling with his own brilliance.

Watching him, John felt that electricity that anything might happen, that living here was a risk, that he could be caught with a stray ashtray at the back of the head as easily as he might be shot in the line of duty.

He's never felt so at home.

In Sherlock's reflection, others fail to compare. A girl here, a girl there, they offer a certain kind of relief, or casual conversation, they enable him to check, and double-check that he's still got the capacity for normality...all the better to reject it when he inevitably goes back to - is left to go back to - Sherlock's world.

"Does this bother you?" Sherlock asks, when John is stitching up the results of a competition: a fresh set of razor blades versus a rusty, stiff-jointed penknife, a hopeful experimentation on bloodstains, which turned into an examination of force required relevant to blade sharpness and cut depth and length, long slashes coupled next to queasily deep stabs.

"Would you like it to bother me?" John ripostes.

"It would be normal for a man to be bothered by his coming home to find his roommate bloody and unrepentant, yes."

"I think the last thing we could describe any part of our living situation as is 'normal', don't you?" John looks tired, sounds tired, is mediating his voice as he pulls together one side to the next.

"Then tell me, at least, does it excite you? Don't return the question to me; your excitement is immaterial, I'm simply curious as to how you'll answer." Sherlock's eyes flash with the excitement, _I let you catch me_ , but John doesn't bite, doesn't even stretch towards it.

"You're never curious about me. You tell me what an open book I am."

"Very well. The heightened concentration you employ, the way you need to wipe your palms more regularly than usual, the deflection of the question, the fact that you are salivating more than anyone who has no-"

"Actually, do stop," John says, taking the needle through a shoved and angled path for maximum discomfort. Sherlock doesn't respond with a muscular twitch as most would; despite the lack of any anaesthesia, he simply, and deliberately - everything is deliberate, there's always a fucking point to his each and every directed motion - runs the tip of his tongue over his front teeth. Nor does he continue the conversation, giving only a look that is both chastising and penetrating.

If John didn't know better (he doesn't know better) he'd think Sherlock had been picking up flirting tips from daytime television. He's caught him watching _Diagnosis Murder_ and _Murder, She Wrote_ and all that on plenty of occasions, and each time Sherlock shouts, like a disclaimer, "These people John, these people, can you believe them?!" to which the obvious answer is, no, Sherlock, of course you can't, because a) 1988, b) American and, most importantly, c) _fictional_.

Not that Sherlock would want to flirt with him, of course, because Sherlock doesn't _do_ flirtation; he hasn't the slightest sense of it, and where would he be going with it, anyway?

Obviously he doesn't want Sherlock to go too far, but, as time passes, he begins to believe, just as Sherlock clearly does himself, that this simply isn't possible. The man is made of more than flesh and bone, has more lives than a cat, has the potential to implode, to explode, to make terrible choices, and yet, and yet...John could not be without him now, because there is something about piecing that body back together that is the culmination and simultaneously the beginning of everything he has learnt up until now.

Once he finds Sherlock out cold and blue-ing on his bedroom floor, heartbeat two minutes absent. the evidence around him clear enough for even Mrs. Hudson to understand that he has been experimenting with the practice of auto-erotic asphyxiation. Without hesitation John performs CPR closely, quickly and easily, thump the hell out of the bastard - ribs so close to the surface they might easily crack; lips deliciously bowed and tasting of tar and deep breaths. When Sherlock comes around, accepting instantly of the offered breath, the fury rises fast inside John, right alongside the adrenaline of success, so he collars Sherlock fast, hand to his narrow, pale throat, threatening, twisting on the blackening redness that rings it, gutteral, "What the _fuck_ do you think you're playing at?" and Sherlock, bloodshot eyes, swollen tongue, rasps only "Harder..."

He means it, wants it, _please_ is not said and if it only were it might yet be obliged.

John drops the grip at Sherlock's throat, hot potato, for fear of this obliging, a thing he knows is in him, particularly with Sherlock of all people beneath him ( _don't, don't explain that_ John's brain begs, five kinds of sideways with excitement, nothing compared to the rush around his body for purchase and enjoyment) and it's deep breaths all around and the exchange of squinting expressions and silent recuperation until the situation is over and it's tea and calm all round.

Later he'll ask Sherlock again, half-hoping to take a different route, also wishing he will close it off altogether, "What the fuck was that all about? What were you doing?" but Sherlock is all wide, glossy eyes now, splayed painted perfect innocence. "Maybe I just wanted you to kiss me, John..."

John puts it down to the earlier lack of oxygen, and nothing changes.

He asks Mrs. Hudson, "Doesn't it worry you?" and she said, "No, dear, he's been off the hard stuff for a long time now. And even when he was...difficult, even then he was ever so careful. Very clean. Cleaner than he is now, probably. He had a sharps bin for a while, and everything. He's a good boy. He wouldn't want to upset me. You should have a little more faith in him."

"But," John wants to ask, but doesn't, "I've found him in situations that have been the very heart of upsetting...so why..." and even then his mind only skirts the edge of the thought that _isn't it funny that I'm the only person who has to deal with these things_...and it never addresses the real question of _why is it that this is the thing that attracts me to this life and to this man the most_...so he still refuses to weigh up whether there is more than he can confess to inside him, because everything else around him resolves itself so quickly and methodically that, amongst the ever-changing landscape of their existence, Sherlock's spontaneous horroshows are the thing that compel him, utterly.

Sherlock isn't careful with himself, John thinks, is sure, even...but he's wrong. Sherlock knows exactly what he's doing, counts the paces, the times, checks John's wherabouts and plays up each self-inflicted self-indulgence for all he can. This is organised. Designed. If Sherlock were to be as clear and precise about it all as he is about everyone else who comes to him for clarity, if he were to deconstruct his own behavioural patterns, which are largely calculated and performed by something very separate from his analytical self, it would be obvious that he is heart-wrenchingly determined that he is doing the only thing he can to keep John exactly where he wants him.

And for Sherlock too there is the idea that his game is not foolproof. Each time he plays, each time he risks himself, each time he pushes his body into something even less understandable, or even harder to fix, or even more bizarre, he wonders, is that it? Is John going to turn away and say, no, that's enough? Has he got it in him to protect himself, to walk away, or is he really in this, hook, line and sinker? It isn't a deliberate test, but that aspect of it is always there.

John passes every time. Flying colours.

Oh, but take it another level up, be fair to them, it's even worse than you think, and so much more than that. John knows all this, even by taking the long route around the fact, and despite that, without acknowledging that, he is glad to be kept, played, content. Sherlock knows that John knows and that he acquiesces to the entire affair. Go on, Sherlock, make my fucking day. _Let me inside you_. They can't be honest with each other with a conversation - why should they? - because the very fact that they both keep playing is an admission of understanding, total, complete - of course it is. There's no other way that such a privately convoluted existence could continue.

There is a part that would concede to sex, to the ultimate wrestling match for top and climax, to the kind of honesty that requires eye contact the next morning, but simultatenously, gratifying as it might momentarily be, it would kill the game, the tension, the unsaid; John doesn't see Sherlock asking for it but would ask for it himself if he didn't already understand that it would take them from _wrong_ to a place that is ratified in the real world, logical and with codes of conduct, and neither wish to embark upon a formal lifestyle that would tip their razorblade-thin balance clean over.

They are each other's everything, the shot and counterpoint, the game, set and fucking match and there will always be asides, the reality that keeps this core ticking over, and if they must, they can come apart and still concede a blow here and there to crush back together again, they will always come back again, until death do us part, that's the phrase, because...

...because once you find this...once you find ~~the thing~~ ~~the excuse~~ the person that lets you take the stabilisers off, that rips your safety catch off and dares you to keep going, when you find the part that lets you play every single bit of yourself, for better or for worse, whether it's taking yourself beyond pain and breath barriers, or whether it's pushing yourself to pull life back into a body that cries out to play one more game, and then another, and then another, it's not something you leave. Not ever.


End file.
